


Topaz for Tourism

by magicgenetek



Series: Dead Men's Party [2]
Category: Kingdom Hearts, Princess and the Frog (2009)
Genre: Cultural Differences, Culture Shock, Discussion of Racism, Disembowelment, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Misunderstandings, Period-Typical Racism, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Canon, Pre-Kingdom Hearts I, Slow Burn, White Privilege
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-19
Updated: 2015-04-22
Packaged: 2018-03-13 20:20:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 10,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3395108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magicgenetek/pseuds/magicgenetek
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Facilier's newest client: a foreigner who is rich, curious, clueless, and most importantly, believes every word out of Facilier's mouth. In a world where the odds are stacked against him, Facilier will take being a tour guide to a rich weirdo over parlor tricks for chump change any day of the week. </p><p>It's not as if he has any fondness for Luxord.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Mice and Dogs

**Author's Note:**

  * For [chuplayswithfire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/chuplayswithfire/gifts).



Facilier had walked New Orleans long enough to know which roads meandered into dead ends and nothings like a dying tree's roots. The poor nested there like mice. Not that he had anything against the poor, or mice, given that he was the former and shared a house with the latter, but when it came time to hunt for souls, they made an ideal place to look. Cats and dogs hunted mice, and Facilier preferred predators for prey.

This white dog, for example, he'd spotted trawling the streets for girls. Facilier had been watching for twenty minutes now. He'd talk to girls on the street corners, listen, and he'd gone back with some scrawny kid some ten minutes past. Come out just now adjusting his belt, and the girl limping.

No one cared about where white men sowed their wild oats, in the neighborhoods where the only way to eat was to sell every piece of you that you had. Dogs ate mice. Natural way of things. If whites weren't meant to live on blacks, why was the world made that way? And who ever heard of a mouse eating a dog?

“Hey, you want to play a game?” Facilier cooed as the man walked past. He held a five dollar bill in one hand and a coin in the other. “Nothin' to lose but a lil' wager.”

The man gave him a look, top to toe, unimpressed; Facilier wasn't all that famous outside of his own community, barring a few exaggerated horror stories, which meant he was usually safe to do this kind of thing. When he did take souls, he took care not to let himself be connected to the deaths. After all, it wasn't him who did the collecting. A scraggly black man in threadbare clothes and relying on a timeworn cane was not a terribly frightening specter.

“What's the game?”

“Jus' a little wager for yer soul.” Facilier waggled the oversize rosary hanging from his neck. “I toss a coin. You tell me if it's in my left hand or my right hand. You lose, you let me have yer soul and I'll help you take it to a nice church. It'll be all tarnished here. You win, I'll give you this.” He waved the five dollar bill. The man watched it greedily. It was almost a day's wages; good money.

“Fine, then.” The man reached out, and Facilier shook his hand. It was a deal.

Facilier flipped the coin. He made an exaggerated catch with his left hand, and carefully dropped the coin down into his sleeve as he presented two closed and empty hands. "Which one?"

"Left."

Facilier opened his left hand and showed it was empty. "Fraid it's not there. A bet's a bet. Your soul is mine, so now - " Facilier said, and then there was a knife in his face. “Oh. Uh, here, sir.”

The man took the five dollars and the coin and left, muttering about stupid street performers and churches roping them into cockamamie plans. Facilier walked in the other direction, into an abandoned alleyway in the moonlight, and checked that no one else was around before dropping his simpering smile and pulling a mask out of his pocket.

It was about the size of his hand. Whoever had carved this one didn't have much finesse; the wood was roughly carved and the painting sloppy. Still, the alligator face was expressive. Ferocious. _Hungry._

Facilier tossed it into a pool of moonlight. “Time to eat.”

The mask threw a shadow on the moonlight. Twitched. Shuddered. Grew. A head and shoulders burst from the concrete like a bather leaving the ocean. Thick arms pushed up and out to pry out the long body, and spines sprung up from the spine as if the concrete had compressed them. The legs pulled free of the concrete into spindly sticks with backwards knees. The mask clattered off as the long alligator jaws grew and pushed it away; it was only meant for human faces.

It looked at Facilier. It had almost dinosaur proportions, with the thick tail dragging between it's legs. Eyes as bright and white as the sun looked expectantly at Facilier.

“What are you waiting for? He's all yours. Just make sure not to be seen or the big one will chew you out again. You know the game,” Facilier said, and picked up the discarded mask. “Be back before sun-up.” The Friend chortled and sunk against the concrete, blending in with the normal shadows as it swam after prey.

One less soul off his debt. One burden off his back. Facilier walked home whistling, hung the mask on the wall, and fell deep into dreamless sleep.


	2. Pay in Chairs

The morning headlines included an article about a man who'd gotten run over in the early hours. He must have been drunk, of course, because he'd been heard yelling about a giant black alligator chasing him. Oh, and how terrible the accident had been, with his chest all busted up, and how he'd screamed and writhed in the darkness before he died in the street. But of course New Orleans' readers should know all about it and have his body on the front page so they knew the dangers of drinking. That's why it had been prohibited, after all.

It was headlines like these that made it worth actually buying the newspaper.

“You look cheerful today.”

Facilier did not jump at a sudden voice in his lonely house. Maybe he was a little startled, but he most definitely folded down his newspaper with complete calm. “White boy, what are you doing in my kitchen?”

“I arrived at the appointed hour,” Luxord said.

“You came in through the window again.” Facilier waved at the window. “At least knock first next time! How did you even open it from the roof? You could have broken your neck and then who will pay me for putting up with your nonsense?!”

“So you're saying,” Luxord said carefully, “you don't want me to come in-tru-da window.”

Facilier felt his mouth drop open. He shut it. “Don't you dare make puns at me unless you're prepared to triple my salary.”

Luxord looked thoughtful.

“That was rhetorical. NO PUNS.”

“If those are the guide's terms, then there will be no puns.” Luxord looked around. “Do you have a chair I can sit in?”

“Not here. This is my kitchen. I live here. In my house. Alone. I only need one chair.”

“I'll pay you in chairs next time.”

“No.”

“Suit yourself.” And with that, Luxord sat on the kitchen floor and pulled out a map.

Facilier tried to ignore him, but it wasn't easy to pretend there wasn't a weirdo doing things on his floor. Once he finished his oatmeal, he gave in to curiosity he peered over the newspaper at Luxord's map.

It was an expensive and detailed map of New Orleans. Luxord was placing stickers on landmarks carefully. Red hearts, blue triangles, black circles, orange squares, pink diamonds.

“With all your talk of heart, those hearts must be where you want to visit. Triangles are on bus stops and piers so they must be transportation. Them squares are on Duke's and those food carts, so I imagine those are places you want to eat at. I don't see any rhyme and reason in the circles or diamonds,” Facilier said.

“Diamonds are places to look at when I”m done with hearts, or if something strange happens. Circles are where I can RTC – ah, places where it's easy for me to get back to where I live because I know the route.”

“Why is there a circle on my house?”

“Places I RTC to and from are the first places I go to and the last places I leave from. Is it not natural to go to my guide before I visit the city?”

“Stop smiling at me like I'm going to think that's flattering. It's not.”

Luxord shrugged and kept on putting stickers on. “It is merely a fact. Do you prefer churches or haunted houses?”

“Definitely haunts. You want to go visit some?”

“Yes. Haunted houses and places of worship often have a great deal of heart, and I want to visit them both. Haunted houses will probably be more fruitful, though....” He tapped his page of stickers to his lips. “What is a plantation? I've seen them mentioned many times in the guide, the old plantation of this or that family, but they don't elaborate on what they are. The old castles of minor nobility?”

“You really aren't from around here,” Facilier said. The man must've been raised in a barn – no, he was rich. The rich version of a barn, then, where nothing went in and money came out. At least this meant he could set the man straight on what plantations really were like – if he had asked a white person about plantations, he'd have gotten a bunch of romantic, white-washed nonsense.

“Plantations were where the royalty of the South used to live. Down here, only two things count: blood and money, and planation owners had plenty of both. They were rich, and that made them good families; they were good families, and that helped them get richer. Rich enough to buy thousands of people and ship them over the sea to work on their farms til they died of exhaustion, and their blood watered the plants that fed and clothed a nation. It was only outlawed to outright own slaves sixty years ago, but did you know that if someone's arrested, you can make them work for free as a punishment? And there's so many illegal things a black man can do. Existing, for one. Having money's another. Sometimes, it's so heinous that they have to outright kill him for his crimes right there on the streets.”

He was gripping his cane so tight it looked as though his knuckles might pop through his skin. Old pains from his bad leg were radiating up from his ankle and knee, sharp as if they were freshly slammed against payment. He'd seen what plantations had done to his grandparents, his aunts and uncles, how it aged his counsins and let his nieces and nephews jumping at noises in the streets. He'd seen it for himself; even if he wanted to forget, the injury that had left him reliant on a cane would never let him.

But he had never been good at keeping in his pain. The truth was painful. Of course it hurt to know.

“Why do you look so surprised, white boy? Where do you think all your European money comes from? Hard work? The sons of plantation owners can sit around and be King of Mardi Gras and barely have to lift a finger because of money made on the backs of the dead; they can show off their houses as castles because they're beautiful and huge because you can have as much house as you want with free labor. It's such a crime you can't work people to death anymore; remember those good old times? Come visit our plantations and lament the loss of our superiority.”

Luxord's face was so pale it could have been bone. “Then. These plantation are graveyards to a multitude of suffering dead.” He shooks his head. “We'll stay away from them. It is ill advised to walk the ground where the tormented lay, and their torment is celebrated; and even were there no risk of unhappy spirits, it is insulting to the dead. Even if there were to be heart found in those places, I am not a man who would disrespect the dead to seek it.”

Facilier felt a knot in his chest loosen. That was a risk – laying out the truth of plantations was dangerous if done in front of most white people – but Luxord wasn't from around here. He'd even sounded like his mother for a moment there, speaking of respecting the dead.

“Perhaps you've got more sense in that head than I thought,” he said. “Even though you're going around to haunted houses, which are liable to have ghosts.”

“I want to find those whose hearts were lost to darkness,” Luxord said. “Wrathful killers who haunt their last hunting grounds, jealous lovers who cannot move beyond those they bothered in life, avaricious people who cannot bear to leave the site of their gold. If I must be haunted, I'd rather it be by those I would not mind fighting against.”

“You'd rather hurt dogs than mice,” Facilier murmured. Luxord's head canted in curiosity, and Facilier spoke again, louder. “If you want the haunts of monsters, I can find you those. You're a fool to be looking for ghosts at all, but at least you're not disturbing those who deserve no disturbance.”

“As you say.” Luxord nodded. “Life's a game – but there are circumstances where it's ill advised to play.”

“And it's a terrible idea to play around with spirits,” Facilier said. “Good. You're not a complete idiot.” He finished his porridge and tapped his foot on the map. “Where do you want to go today?”

Luxord tapped his page of stickers to his lips. “How about you take me to church?”


	3. The Game: I

The noon sun gave Shadow space to make faces and watch as Facilier added markings to the stickers with a pen. Luxord's eyes followed every movement.

“So we can't go to these churches,” and Luxord pointed to the stickers with 1 written on them, “because you're black and they're white and you'd get kicked out so fast that your head would spin. We can't go to these ones,” and he pointed to a sticker labeled 2, “because you'd get in trouble for bringing a white man to a black church. Which leaves these ones,” labeled with 3s, “which accept people of different races and wouldn't mind.” He grimaced. “Which seem few and far between. Tensions must be high.”

“You have no idea,” Facilier said, and shifted off his knees. His bad leg twinged in pain, and he grimaced. “I can't believe I had to give you the race talk. What kind of hillbilly town did you grow up that you don't know all this?”

“What's a hillbilly?”

Facilier squinted at Luxord. “You best be glad you established the teaching thing in the contract, or you'd be charged extra right now. Hillbillies live in the middle of nowhere, real rural places. Like the people who live in the bayous here. Lots of little towns made up of a few dozen people and dirt roads there.”

Luxord considered it. “I am from somewhere far away. You'd call me sheltered. This world, this place, are all things new to me. I don't think you'd know where I was from, given how far off it is.”

“Is that so? I'm pretty smart for someone my age,” Facilier said, a spark in his eyes. “What kind of place are you from, then? Or do you still want to stay clammed up about it?”

“I don't wish to talk about it,” Luxord said. He tilted his head to the other side. “You are curious, though. What do you think of a little game to pass the time and ameliorate your curiosity?”

“Depends on what the rules are.”

“You can pick the game in question, as long as I know how to play it,” Luxord said. “Winner gets to ask the loser a question, and the loser must answer it honestly, no matter how personal it is. Only one question per game. Questions may not have multiple parts.”

“I can work with this,” Facilier said. He knew plenty of games, and he knew how to cheat at all of them. It was a good thing Luxord was so malleable, wasn't it? If the loa still worked with him, he'd be giving them thanks for this golden goose of money and entertainment. He might even give them a little offering after this, with how well it was going! It paid to be grateful. “Do you know rock paper scissors?”

“Of course.” Luxord set a closed fist on an open hand.

“Rock, paper, scissors, go!”

Luxord threw scissors. Facilier threw rock. Facilier laughed in victory. “Ha! There we go. So, where are you from?”

Luxored sighed. “It was a little town. In your language, it would be called Radiant Garden.”

“Like your name?”

“Yes. My family's been there for a very long time. I assume you can draw conclusions from my wealth and that fact.”

“So you're some noble's son in some rural village in a far off country,” Facilier said.

Luxord nodded. “I assume you can make more assumptions from there.”

“Going on vacation with a lot of money... Daddy doesn't want you in the village. Or you wanted to go and he didn't mind you leaving. Or you stole the money. Either way, you aren't the favored son.”

“Very good,” Luxord said. There was no flicker of emotion hidden behind his smile. Annoying, that. But Luxord's expressions were always flattened and still, as if he were a doll come to life, so it was to be expected. Most people had little quick expressions that happened between the big ones; they might try to pretend some emotion or other, but the real ones were there, between the lines, if you knew where to look. Flashes between smiles, the movement of fingers, the positioning of feet, it added up. And for a man who lived off pleasing those he could get into the shop, knowing how to find the real expression under fake ones was one difference between life and death.

It wasn't foolproof. It wasn't perfect. But he could do it well enough to see that Luxord didn't have any.

“What else? You're here to find places with heart. Haunted houses. Churches. Carnivals. Places that are highly emotional, but not despairing. You're here on some hedonistic kick, and you're willing to pay for it. Nobles let their sons get away with all kinds of things, and yours are surprisingly tame. Most men go to gambling parlors or whorehouses for fun, not...this. You're strange.”

“Another well supported conclusion,” Luxord said. He kept the same half smile, body stilled. “I have wealth. I can find pleasures of the body wherever I wish. But in a country after a war – ah, I'm sure you know there are wars everywhere, after all – there is often little gaiety. Finding some happiness in no small thing.”

“A war,” Facilier said. The Great War had ended almost eight years ago – but he'd heard that some places in Europe were still fighting, or had picked fights. He'd never been in a war, but he'd seen what it had done to the men who came back from it. Enough of the uninjured returned jumping at loud noises. And the injured – flesh burned away or limbs missing or hacking coughs that never went away, head injuries that left the face slackened or thinking slowed -

Head injuries. Sometimes head injuries changed how people thought and acted. Emotions enhanced or removed. Kind men turned cruel or returned to their childhood. Difficulty with tasks, sometimes. He'd seen his mother treating soldiers for injuries that pained them long after they should have or helping those whose families were still adjusting to taking care of them. Healing was a slow process, and sometimes it never happened at all.

For the poor and black, that meant working even harder than before to try and support that family. But for a rich white man's son, if he'd come back a war hero with a head injury to change him, there were other options.

Perhaps it was too painful to have Luxord around in a changed state. Maybe this was an attempt to get rid of him. Or, perhaps, this was a father's gift to a son unable or unwilling to inherit.

“You were in a war. The Great War?”

“I don't know if that was what it was called. It was something else, to us,” Luxord said guilelessly. “But I did fight.”

“Did you get hurt?”

“All soldiers get hurt in war.”

“Don't dance around the subject. I said did you, specifically, get hurt.”

“I told you I'd answer one question truthfully, Facilier. I did. If you want me to answer this next one, you need to beat me in a game.”

Rock, paper, scissors. Facilier threw rock again and Luxord threw scissors again. Facilier cheered and then gave Luxord a gloating glance.

“Fine,” Luxord said, face blank. “I was injured. Multiple times. I cannot count how many, for I lost track.”

“At least one of those injuries did something to you. You changed,” Facilier said. It was a theory, but he had enough behind it that he was sure it would bring something forward.

“War changes people,” Luxord said. “Even without injuries. But,” he added before Facilier could object to his vagueness, “I imagine you have good reason to think I changed. Do you believe I am not a normal person?”

“Yes.”

“How so? Am I some awful creature, come to swoop away with your soul like a ghoul in the night?”

“Hardly. Don't take me for some superstitious peasant back in the old country. I know what war can do to a man. You're hardly the first one with your problem I've met.” He tapped his temple conspiratorially.

That got a reaction. Luxord's eyes widened, and he leaned forward in interest. “Is that so?”

“Yes.” Facilier nodded. “They don’t have a solution for it, do they? The doctors. There's nothing anyone can do after an injury like that. No one knows what to do after your head gets knocked about. You're good at faking it, but your emotions ain't all there, are they?”

Luxord's reaction was mixed. There was a slight deflation of his shoulders and eyebrows, disappointed, when he mentioned injury, and then they all raised again at the mention of emotions. “You've come near to the problem I have.”

That reaction – maybe it wasn't a head injury. But what else could cause this? He did not think Luxord was born like this, given how he'd near confirmed that he'd changed. Or maybe he was upset at the mention of it?

“And after being in a war, you don't mind danger so much. You're not afraid of ghosts, or maybe you can't feel fear. But happiness is contagious.”

“Even an empty glass can make music if you sing to it,” Luxord said. “Vibrations carry.”

“And what place has more heart than New Orleans? Especially during Mardi Gras.” The puzzle pieces were clicking into place. “Even the dead sing during Carnival.”

“The dead reanimate here?!”

“No, no, it's a figure of speech.” Mostly. Summoning your ancestors for advice didn't count, right?

“Oh. Good.” Luxord nodded as if to reassure himself. “This world has enough strife without dealing with the unrest of the dead. Even if there seems to have been enough bloodshed to populate the world in ghosts.”

“There's enough people working to ease the unhappy dead that we're not up to our ears in hauntings,” Facilier said. He thought again of his mother, and how she had walked the path between life and death for the dying, healing those she could and easing the passing of the rest. How she and his grandmother would work together to appease unhappy spirits with offerings and song to help them rest. His mother worked healing until the week before her death.

“Good tidings.” Luxord ran his fingers over a few heart shaped stickers. “Are any of these churches open today?”

“I know that one will be open at 5.” Facilier tapped a sticker. “We can get lunch on the way there. There's a park nearby that we wouldn't stand out in if there's time to kill.”

“Excellent. Shall we leave now?”


	4. The Game: II

They did leave this time.

Lunch was a quiet affair; Facilier was too busy stuffing his face with street vendor sausage to talk, and Luxord was filling his eyes with the sights of the town. They didn't speak until half an hour of walking had passed.

“How much further?”

“Another half hour,” Facilier replied.

“Do you need to stop and rest?” Luxord asked.

Facilier smacked his cane on the ground. “I am _fine._ I'm not so crippled that I can't handle a little trek across the city! You saw me last week.”

“I did,” Luxord said. “I had to carry you back to your house.”

“Only because I was drinking. I'm sober now, aren't I?”

Luxord's reply was a noncommittal noise. Facilier rumbled and kept walking, fingers tight on his cane. Sure, his leg ached and the cane helped, but he'd lived with the pain for years. He didn't need a customer's pity or to play the sad cripple where people could see him.

“A game,” Luxord said. “Rock, paper, scissors - “

Facilier played rock. Luxord played paper. Facilier groaned, because he could just tell what question was going to come out of Luxord's mouth now.

“What happened to your leg?”

He knew it. “I was attacked,” Facilier said shortly. “My leg didn't heal right. It's nothing to concern you, white boy.”

That was the truth. It was a small truth, stripped of context and meaning, but a truth was what the game asked for, not the whole story. The only other person who knew what really happened that night had been the one to find him when the mob had left, and she had taken that secret to the grave. Not even his grandmother knew. Like hell he'd tell someone he'd met all of twice in the last week.

There was no answer from Luxord. Facilier didn't dare look at his face; that might trigger another question backed by rock paper scissors and he preferred when the game was his to use on Luxord, not vice versa.

CLANG.

Now Facilier looked up; Luxord had walked into a stop sign.

“Ow,” Luxord said. “Oops.”

“Don't stare at people when you’re walking or this will happen,” Facilier snapped. “You should pay me more to put up with this nonsense.”

“You think so?” Luxord said, rubbing the side of his face. It probably wouldn't bruise, but it'd be red and sore for at least a few minutes. “We can renegotiate.”

Facilier stopped himself from saying, 'you're too nice.' Because it was true. Bending so easily to another's will was bad for anyone, especially a noble's son. But that niceness was keeping Facilier fed, and he wanted to keep it that way.

“Bring me oranges next time,” Facilier said. “It's hard to get fresh fruit in winter.”

“I can do that,” Luxord said.

“I'd like to see you try on this short of notice,” Facilier said.

Luxord smiled, an irritating little grin that he was quickly growing to hate. It reminded him of children on the playground, beating others at their favorite game for the hell of it - smug and sure. “Then you will.”

Facilier snorted. That was so ludicrous that it wasn't even funny! Maybe it was a little funny. But he couldn't wait to see the look on Luxord's face when he came without any oranges at all. Hell, maybe he'd turn orange from the humiliation! Now that was funny.

He heard a chuckle from beside him. Luxord's laughter was low and soft, near inaudible, and he almost looked surprised by it; his hand wavered over his chest.

“Yes, yes, very funny,” Facilier said, unable to completely hide a smile. Luxord was a fool, too soft, too friendly, but what seemed to be his worst states were little more than schoolboy pranks and bad puns, and at his best toed the edge between idiocy and compassion. Even if the hand held out to Facilier belonged to a fool of the highest nature, it was still a hand he could use to pull himself up.


	5. Take Me To Church

They stayed at the very back of the Catholic church; the setting sun haloed pinks and golds on their pews by way of the stained glass windows. Luxord spent most of mass watching people: the priests, the choir, the reactions during the homily. It would probably be impolite to call his eyes sinkholes, but they swallowed everything they saw.

Luxord pointed toward the doors in the closing minutes, and they snuck out before the crowd left.

“The architecture was nice,” Luxord said once they were well out of earshot of the church. “I liked the windows. The choir is skilled, even if their material is lacking. Why was most of that in fairy speech instead of this one?”

“Fairy – you mean Latin?” Luxord nodded. Facilier shrugged. “Catholics do most of their masses in Latin. I don't know why. You a Protestant?”

Luxord shook his head. “No.” He used his hands to create a triangle. “Do you know this faith?”

“No, nothing with triangles.” Facilier sighed. “You're lucky you met me. Pagans aren't so popular here.”

“Do they burn people at the stake here?”

Facilier snoted. “What kind of question is that? We're not peasants in the old country. We don't burn people here.” Luxord started to relax. “We hang them.”

Luxord tensed again; his eyes swept the land around them as he reached for a pocket, where a soldier might carry a gun. Facilier patted his shoulder. “Calm down. You shouldn't be in any danger. You're a rich white man; as long as you keep your mouth shut, you should be fine.”

Luxord did not untense, and he thrust his hands in his pockets as if afraid they would rocket off of his wrists. “But the same can't be said for you.”

“I've lived here all my life and I haven't died yet. You sticking your nose in things is only liable to make things worse,” Facilier said.

“There's no point in paying a corpse,” Luxord said. “Risks can be minimized.”

“You gamble a little, don't you?” Facilier waved his cane. “With your games of truth and all. There's always a risk and always a chance.”

Luxord shook his head. “There's risk and chance and the whims of luck, but in every game there is a skill. The odds of two pair or full house, or when the time is right to draw a card. You can make your own luck. That way, you know when the time is right to put your life on the line; you'd hardly want to bet it on every throwaway chance, would you?”

“Unless your life's the only thing you've got to bet,” Facilier snapped, a sudden flush of fury to his cheeks.

Luxord did not flinch, per se, but there was a shadow of a movement, as if he knew he should be hurt by it. “My apologies,” he said, and that was all he had to say for the rest of the walk home.

When they reached Facilier's shop, Luxord gave him a bag of jewels. “For today,” he said. He left through the ladder to Facilier's roof, leaving Facilier with a bag full of treasure.

That left Facilier to do business.

First, he pried open the floorboard where he kept his money. Three moonstones and an emerald were there, still unspent. Ten more moonstones and a topaz joined them. He estimated that once cashed and Luxord's entertainment money was taken out, those would pay for candles, supplies, pain medication, firewood and food for at least two weeks; maybe more if he didn't have an emergency. Cousin Melvin the jeweler said that moonstones weren't rare, but one was enough to be a white man's daily pay. That was good enough, as far as Facilier was concerned.

Once the floorboard was back on, money securely hidden, he checked his door; three notes had been shoved under while he had been gone. Two separate requests for help for a mother whose pregnancy was killing her, please visit us tomorrow, payable in canned goods from the mother and a half full jar of pain medication from the sister, and a charm for hair growth for a nervous young beau.

He set out supplies for making the charm, and was going through his herbs when Shadow tugged on his sleeve and pointed at the clock. Nine. Eat!

One stovetop dinner of canned beans mixed with the last of the bacon he'd bought with his new money later, Facilier was near dozing. His knee and ankle ached from all the walking, so he took a pill before bed, made sure the window was tightly shut, and shuffled under the covers.

Facilier was asleep before his head hit the pillow.


	6. Oranges

The week flew past. Two days helping a midwife, changing bloody sheets, compounding herbs and trying to channel power to help the mother; a third plying her with pills and charms until someone stopped panicking enough to get a priest to help with what had not become a child. One day making and delivering a charm to a white man for a pittance of money. One in bed when his leg started shooting pains when he put any pressure on it and wouldn't stop. Two with a table on the street, doing tricks for passersby and keeping his ear out for anything interesting.

On the eighth day, there was a knock on his door around noon. Facilier sighed and got up his pestle and mortar and opened the door.

It was immediately obvious why Luxord had not come in via the window this time. It would have been very difficult to do that while holding such a large basket of oranges.

Facilier stared.

“You said to bring oranges,” Luxord said in reply to the stare. “They're as fresh as I could find them.”

Finally, Facilier deflated. “Give those to me,” he grumbled, and Luxord handed him the orange basket and walked inside.

Facilier put the oranges on his table and stared at them. They were bigger than any oranges he had ever seen before, and their rinds were as bright as a Mardi Gras costume. He opened one up and peeled it. The fragrance cut through candle smoke like a knife; it was like it he were nine at Christmas again, and Mama had saved up to get him an orange as one of his presents.

One slice of orange. It was sweeter than he remembered.

Luxord watched Facilier peel and eat the orange, slice by slice, bite by bite. His hand hovered over his chest. Facilier barely noticed him through the haze of nostalgia. They did not speak until Facilier had nothing left but rind.

“Does that suffice?”

“It does,” Facilier said. “How much did these cost? Where did you get them from?”

“Hydroponic gardening,” Luxord said. Facilier gave him a confused look. “It's a way to grow crops indoors. The plants grow inside a pool of water under a series of powerful lamps. The farmers feed in the nutrients for the plants into the water, and the lamps mimic the sun. It's expensive, but it means food can be grown despite the weather and it doesn't require the same kind of labor.”

“A way to grow fruit indoors; I bet it's expensive. Who'd do something like that when they can use cheap labor?” Facilier picked up another orange. “But it's a good idea. And the rich will pay for fruit in the winter.”

Luxord beamed.

“Show off,” Facilier muttered with a smile, and rolled the orange to Luxord. “Eat up. Where are we going today?”

“The church didn't have the kind of heart I wanted. Let's go to a haunted house.” Luxord pulled the orange apart deftly, opening it so that the slices lay open like a flower in bloom.

Facilier didn't watch as Luxord ate, instead going to one of his bookshelves to take a book on haunted houses in New Orleans. “Did you have a place in mind?”

“Let's start small. The Herman-Grima Historical House.”

“I hear they've got friendly ghosts,” Facilier said with a nod. “That'll do.” Luxord got out his map; Facilier found the place on it.

And realized, with a sinking feeling, how far it was from his house.

“It's a two hour walk. We're going to have to take the bus,” Facilier said. The good feeling from the oranges evaporated under the assault of dread.

Luxord grimaced. “What's wrong with the bus?”

“Whites and blacks sit in different parts of the bus. If I sit with you in front, I'm liable to get hurt. If you sit with me in the back, you're liable to get suspicion. I don't want to risk either. But if we don't take the bus – even if we could walk fast enough, I don't think either of our legs could take it.” His own certainly couldn't. His knee was aching just thinking about it.

“I wouldn’t know which stop to get off on,” Luxord said. “Unless you stopped the bus and then I got off with you?”

“That could work,” Facilier said. “Still. This isn't going to be fun. We'll be going to a good part of town, so I'll need to dress right.” Couldn't be recognized as Facilier the witch doctor, couldn't look too poor or too rich, couldn't draw the eye, he was not going to let himself be seen or remembered if he had to go out there.

“Dress right?”

“I look too rich, there'll be trouble. I look too poor, that'll also cause trouble.”

“There's laws about how to dress?”

Luxord's incredulity would be funny if it wasn't another reminder of how far apart they were. “Not as such, but the court of opinion can be just as deadly as a real court. There's no good reason to get anyone's attention up there.”

“So you have to dress in a way that's not too rich or too poor, and I assume different from your normal outfit. Isn't that a lot of fuss to go through?”

“I don't want to hear that from you,” Facilier grumbled. “You can't pay a dead man to tour you around New Orleans, and I'm trying not to get killed.” His knee groaned.

Luxord nodded. “Then we'll take the precautions needed. Should I dress differently to allay suspicion as well?”

“I don't have any clothes that'd fit you round the waist. You'd bust the seams.” Sigh. “Besides, I think you showing up in my clothes would just cause more rumors, and I don't need that.”

“Why?”

Facilier gave him a look. “You don't have a clue, do you?”

“About what?”

“If you don't know, I'm not going to tell you. You don't pay me enough for that.”

“I can pay you more!”

Facilier hesitated. “How much?”


	7. the nope bus to nopeville

“So you're saying that in your country, men can marry other men and no one cares?” It was a damn stupid conversation to be having out in the open, but Luxord said such ridiculous things that he had to chase them down. Besides, there was no one else at the bus stop. As much as the rumble of car engines made Facilier's back tense into painful knots and his knee ache, it also hid their quiet conversation.

“There's no taboo on marriages between the genders at all. Hasn't been for at least four hundred years. Since that was a sticking point in the War of Tiniest Marks as a reason to attack - “

“Slow down, slow down, what's the War of Tiniest Marks?”

“One of the major points of the War of Tiniest Marks was the use of forbidden weapons that spread the disease of tiny marks. I believe that's it's name in your language? The places they attacked had no protection from the tiny marks, so only one out of ten people survived when the disease spread. Then the invaders would come into the depopulated area, slaughter or enslave the survivors, then take over the cities and infrastructure and reshape them at their leisure.”

“Disease of tiny marks. You mean smallpox?”

“That's it! Smallpox. But since killing entire countries' worth of people is forbidden and illegal in multiple treaties as well as immoral, when word got out, there was a near unanimous agreement for everyone to lay down arms and gang up on those responsible. Aside from those complaints, no one wanted to be the next victim.”

“Makes sense. No one wants to die, and smallpox is a nasty way to go.” Facilier nodded and adjusted his bowler hat. He'd switched from brilliant purples to brown and black, with patches that were close enough to the original fabric to not be noticed from afar.

“When the war was over, many of the things that had been popular with the invaders became stigmatized. The alliance also created stronger feelings of friendship between countries, so some cultural taboos lessened.”

“And so what'd be a den of sin here is just fine elsewhere.” Facilier squinted. “Maybe you aren't from Europe after all. They aren't that depraved.”

“I never said I was from Europe. I don't know what my country is known as here.”

“Hmph.” Facilier gave him another look over. Earrings, European-ish accent, and he'd look Chinese if not for the blonde hair and blue eyes. “You from South America?”

Luxord shrugged. “I don't know where that is.”

“You don't even - your rich father's tutors were worthless. Hablas Espanol? Parlez-vous français?”

Luxord shakes his head. “Skeniksugo de hanashite kudasai. Or... hal tatakallam al-lughah al-'arabīyah?”

“I don't understand a word of it,” Facilier sighed.

“Ah, well.” There was a roar as a bus turned the corner and snarled to a halt in front of them. Facilier was tight-knuckled as he entered the bus, counted out his fare, and shuffled to the back, leaning heavily on his cane; he could hear Luxord's coins drop into the coin tin, and saw him pick a row only a few in front of Facilier.

It was a thirty minute ride. It felt longer. Facilier's heart jumped every time someone got on or off the front of the bus. Every time someone looked at him. He fiddled with his cane or the brim of his hat, straightened his lapels, did anything he could to prevent himself from panicking. The bus's rumble made his fingers shake on his cane. It was as loud and threatening as a dog's growl, and the crackling of the engine as it slowed made his heart skip.

Finally, they were at the right stop. Facilier yanked on the rope on the window to slow the bus hard enough for it to bite into his hand. His cane thunked hard on the bus's floor as he followed Luxord out, his knee twanging pain with each step.

The bus snarled as it left, and the noise was enough to make Facilier stumble. Luxord caught him before he could fall to his feet, steadied him, with a gentleness that his stubby fingers belied.

“Get off,” Facilier muttered once his feet were square on the ground. “You're gonna draw attention, acting like this.”

And like that, Luxord's hands were gone as if they were never there. “As you say,” Luxord replied. His hands dipped into his pockets. “Just a few blocks, yes?”

“Yes.”

And a few blocks it was until the red brick of the Herman Grima House came into view. Luxord looked up at it as if it were an oyster to crack open and find pearls in. There was a small group of white people leaving the building, and Facilier could see more in the window.

If he held his cane any tighter, he might snap it in two.

“Can you give me cash?” Luxord murmured.

Facilier wordlessly handed him a bundle of one dollar bills.

“Good.” Luxord made a small shooing gesture. “Can you find a place to stay outside?”

Thank goodness, Facilier thought. “I can. Trying to get rid of me already?” he said out loud, forcing a grin.

“Ah, you see through me at once,” Luxord said, and his voice was too flat to tell if he was being serious or acknowledging that this was some kind of ploy for Facilier's comfort.

Facilier decided it was serious and he would not ponder this further dammit. “I'll sit out here. Take your time, white boy.”


	8. Hunter

 Facilier found a seat outside of the house to wait once Luxord was in the House, hat pulled low as if it could hide him. He closed his eyes to think. Mama said, to calm down, count from 100 back down to 1, and keep an ear out for trouble. One hundred, ninety nine, ninety eight....

...Forty three, forty two. He felt rather than heard someone approach, and didn't look up. Didn't dare open his eyes until he felt something fall into his lap.

Blink.

A sprig of dried lavender was in his lap, and the presence was hovering just behind his shoulder. He picked the flower up; it was delicate and flaking. Ancient. Perhaps someone had dried it decades ago.

“Thank you,” he murmured, and kissed the lavender. He felt a weight against his shoulder like a hand, large and comforting, and then it was gone.

He didn't have to look around to know no one alive was around. He looked anyway. The street was as busy as it had been half an hour ago, but no one was looking at him.

Well, it was supposed to be haunted, wasn't it?

He'd settled enough to start people watching (rich man cheating on wife, children fresh out of school, harried mother chasing the children) when Luxord exited the building. There were twin points of color on his cheeks. “They said I could come back anytime!”

“I'm glad you made a good impression,” Facilier said.

“So am I! They wouldn't tell me where they keep the altar to the spirits, though. Or do they not do that here?”

Facilier squinted. “Alter?”

“You need to give spirits who refuse to pass on offerings to please them so they don't become vengeful. Usually we set up an alter somewhere discrete to give them offerings until they decide they're ready to pass,” Luxord explained. “Candles and flowers are favored where I'm from, but others use food scraps or poems. Do we have to go back on that bus?”

“We do.” Facilier withheld a shudder. “We should go now. I'll count out the fare money.”

They began walking. Facilier pulled a handful of coins from his pocket and started going through them, trying to focus on the warmth of the metal instead of the cool dread pooling in his chest. Nickel, nickel, dime, prepare it, stay focused. Don't think about the vibration of the engine in the bus floor.

“Could we rent a car?” Luxord asked.

“No!”

Luxord didn't break stride at the shout. “A chocobo or a horse, then?”

“There aren't any chocobos here! And I can't afford a horse!” His voice squeaked. He coughed, trying to get it back under control. He couldn't afford to make a scene here.

“Chocobos are the most even tempered and reliable beasts of burden, even if they can only fit three people at most. They should be here.” Luxord's voice was still even. “White chocobos are usually preferred in cities, since they're small, don't need as much exercise, and are the most even tempered breed.” He talked on and on, but Facilier could barely focus on the words. The world was in sharp focus. Two white men walking behind them. The cars rumbling past. The feeling of sidewalk cracks under his feet.

The bus stop was there in no time. Then the bus. The fare. The seat at the back. The bus shaking around him and the noise and he clutched his cane and stared at the floor. Waiting. Trying to make the time pass faster than inch by dragging inch, every second agonizingly slow like fingers dragging against asphault.

Stops passed. He felt like his heart would stop if he had to go through another one -

A cool hand wrapped around his wrist. Facilier's voice was caught in his throat. It took a moment of stumbling to look up and see Luxord dragging him off the bus, onto the sidewalk, and away.

“This isn't – this isn't our stop!” Facilier hissed, voice squeaking out an octave higher than he intended. “What are you doing, you idiot?”

“You looked like your heart was about to give out!” Luxord hissed back.

Facilier shook his head. “Doesn't matter! It's a half an hour walk from here to get home, and this isn't a good place!”

“Then we'll walk, or catch a ride. Maybe there's horses here.”

“There's not.” Facilier dragged Luxord down to a familiar alley; he hadn't been here in nearly three weeks, not since he'd fed the gator Friend, but he knew his road well enough to have his hackles raised in daytime. “This is where whites come to pick up street walkers that they don't want their wives knowing about. No one cares who gets hurt or killed down here 'cause they think everyone here's expendable, and I don't intend to end up target practice!”

Footsteps. Close. Where were they coming from?

“What's a street walker?” Luxord asked.

“You need to pay me double to find that out,” Facilier snapped.

“Or you could let us pay,” said another. Facilier spun around and stared.

There had been two white men at the bus stop, before. And they were here again now. Blocking the the way they had entered the alley.

“Who are you?” Luxord asked. Facilier distantly registered a shift in Luxord's stance, in his shoulders, as he faced the men. All Facilier could focus on was measuring the distance between him and the men, between him and the other end of the alley. His knee was screaming pain but he could make it. But where would he go next?

“You've been giving him money,” said one of the men. “And letting him talk up to you.”

“And?”

“We want a turn to play with him. Or we want your money. One of the two,” said the other man. “He's got to be good if you let him talk like that.”

“I think you misunderstand things,” Luxord said. “He's just my tour guide.”

“We can give you a tour! We'll make it your money's worth.”

“I'm getting mixed signals about your intentions,” Luxord said. “Or perhaps I'm not used to being mugged in this place. But neither lust nor greed make a difference to me.”

With a flick of his wrist, a card emerged in his hand. Another twist of fingers and the card had become an open bag full of glittering jewels. “How about this, gentlemen? I love a gamble. Let's play a game.”

“What about me?” Facilier asked.

Luxord's hand flickered again, and Facilier caught the card he threw. “Go home. This isn't a game for you.”

“But - “

“Go home,” Luxord said again, steel in his voice. “I'll see you at our next appointment.”

Facilier ran.

It didn't last. But two blocks away, he pulled Shadow up out of the ground and got them to help lift his aching legs. No one was out at this time of day; they were all sleeping off the night before or out working until the sun was far below the horizon. Facilier knew this knife edge of desperation well enough to risk Shadow's help; who'd mind one more strange and twitching man here, where no one cared who lived or died?

He was covered in cold sweat by the time he made it to his house. He collapsed once the door was closed; his knee felt close to breaking. Every breath sent shards of pain up and down his leg.

“Damn,” he wheezed, “idiot.” He rolled onto his side, trying to get pressure off his leg. “I can't get money from a corpse. But I don't have a death wish.”

**Do you have a problem?**

Facilier heard rather than saw the bull-faced mask approach; after a moment, he could feel snorts of not-breath puffing on his face. “Calm down. I want to make a trade, but – not a big one. A soul, and Gator goes out to watch my stupid customer so he doesn't get killed doing something stupid.”

 **You said stupid twice in the same sentence,** the bull-faced mask stated. Facilier lashed out with the cane and felt wood hit wood; the mask clattered away. **I simply state a fact.  
**

“Do I look in a mood to play games?” Facilier said. “I don't want my golden goose getting slaughtered until I've wrung every egg out of him.”

 **Your averice knows no bounds. So be it.** The bull-faced mask nodded. **We have a deal. Gator! Come, for it is time to hunt.**

Facilier forced himself to sit up as the gator mask floated down. “He was last seen where I found you dinner,” he said. “Go find him. If he's in danger, keep him safe. I need him alive.”

The mask's jaw clattered and gaped in silent laughter as a shadow grew beneath it until it popped off toothy jaws. The shadow gator winked at Facilier with one sun-bright eye, then sunk down into the ground as if it were water and swam out under the door and away.

“Shadow,” he gasped, and his shadow stood; his body was tugged up along with it. He leaned heavily on his cane to help up the stairs, and he collapsed into bed once he was there.

“Pills.” Shadow dropped the bottle next to him, and Facilier took two out and swallowed them whole.

“Water.” Shadow brought a glass and Facilier drank; his hands shook, but he did not spill.

“Good.” That was what he needed. He knew himself well enough to know he couldn't get food down tonight. He would sleep and hope that the medication wouldn't have worn off when he woke up again.

He slept. He slept so soundly he didn't hear the door to the shop slam open and shut again, or the clattering of masks downstairs.

The shadowy gator's sides puffed in and out as if it were a living creature that needed air, that had ran hard enough to be gasping for breath; oily liquid dripped out of a long scratch on one arm. It shoved itself back into the mask like a snail hiding in it's shell.

 **What's wrong?** Taunted a mask with blood red lips. **Get spooked by an automobile again? You're almost as bad as the meal ticket.**

The bull-faced mask tsked. **Our brethren is injured. No mortal instrument could cause such. What did this?**

The nothing man! the gator cried. **The nothing man is a hunter!**


	9. Hunted

 Once upon a time, Gator had been human. He had hunted gators. He'd lived with them,watched them, killed them, skinned them, sold them for parts. They were dangerous, but the money was almost as good as the thrill of the chase and the kill.

It was so much better, to be the gator and hunt the humans. How better was the chase when your prey could think as well as you could? And how more exciting the kill when you could devour not just the body but the soul, to have every death plump his flesh with power?

Being a shadow made it easy. Light was water, darkness was land. The sun had only barely started to pink as it set, so he had plenty of places to swim on New Orlean's streets. And who spent so much time looking at the ground that they'd notice him, a shadow that was there and then gone?

The nothing man's scent wasn't easy to follow. He didn't smell like _anything._ Everything had a smell – even water had a smell – but there was nothing of him for Gator to use to track. Instead, he followed the scent of the leather coat with its hints of floral oils and smoke. Gator had not smelled anything like those oils in the city. Once he found them in the alleyway, he could follow wherever they went.

Down long streets and through fields and fields of new planted crops and past the edges of the city, where the trees grew short and fat with roots knee-deep in marsh water. Down where there weren't many humans at all, and the smell of human blood was a splotch of brightness among salt and decaying plant matter.

He crept up on one tree. Three in a clearing: one with a knife, one on the ground, and the nothing man watching.

Clapping.

“Well done. He's breathed his last,” Luxord said.

“He is,” said the man with the knife. There was blood dripping down one arm, and his face was coloring bruise-bright. “That means I get paid, doesn't it?”

“I told you that if you killed your friend, you'd become rich, and here's the proof of it.” Luxord pulled out a small sack and tossed it to the man. “Enjoy your newfound riches. What emotions fill your heart now?”

The man looked down at the one on the ground, then back up to Luxord. “Satisfaction,” he said, but his face belied his words. Gator snickered.

Luxord's head snapped toward Gator. He went silent; he was hidden in the shadows of the branches. How could any mortal creature see him? He was invincible.

“What is it?” the man with the knife asked.

“Nothing,” Luxord replied. “I'll leave you to deal with the body. Farewell.”

He disappeared into the bayou, dropping a few playing cards as he left. The man with the knife sagged, then sat down next to the dead man. He turned over the great jewel in his hands. “Why the hell did you have to go and attack me for?” he asked the dead man. “If you'd have just given up easy, I wouldn't have had to do that to you! I wasn't going to give up a sack of diamonds!”

No response. The gator stretched in anticipation of a chase,a battle, fresh blood. This one was wounded, and was wicked enough to kill a companion for money. He would be delicious.

The man wiped his knife clean on the ground, then took the body and rolled it into a nearby stream. Even if the body was discovered, the water would speed decomposition, the gator knew. Smart choice. Perhaps the man had done this before.

Good. Fellow hunters were the most delicious prey.

Gator slid down to the grass at the man's feet; as the man started to move, Gator sprung. He caught the man in an iron grip and tackled him to the dirt. Fingers scrabbled against leathery scales as Gator spun them both into the water. A shadow like Gator didn't need air to breathe, and even the sharpest knife only felt like a little scratch. Keeping the man underwater until he stopped struggling was child's play. Then, he tossed the man back on land and ripped into his stomach.

It was delicious. There was a wheeze of pain that sent chills of ecstasy up Gator's spine. After swallowing the chunk of meat in one rapterous gulp, he shoved his claws up into the ribcage and yanked out the heart.

This was the best part of the kill. The soul resided in this meaty container; he could take it out without disembowelment, sure, but what was the fun in that? And oh, how it gushed blood in his mouth as he chewed – oh, how the soul within screamed and writhed as it slithered down his throat, the cruelty within tasting acrid as coal smoke.

“Cards!”

Gator's legs moved before his thoughts could, thrusting him away from his meal against a tree. When he turned around, playing cards the size of men had surrounded the spot where he'd been feeding just moments before like a cage.

“So the bait gets a nibble at last – and what a catch it is!” Luxord's voice rang out, and Gator felt rather than heard feet hit the ground running. He submerged; Luxord swang a huge card like a sword and took a chunk out of the tree that had been behind Gator's head a moment before. Gator sprang up behind him and tackled him to the ground hard enough to jar shoulders. Luxord snarled and jammed his fingers into Gator's eye sockets hard enough to dislodge sleeve from wrist and gem studded bangle. A shadow could feel no pain, but with eyes gone, Gator would have to rely on practice for this kill. Luxord was hunting gators – but this gator was no prey for mortals – and Facilier wouldn't mind so much if he had Luxord's wallet in the end, right?

“Sparkga!”

Pain exploded in Gator's shoulder as something bright as starlight burst at Luxord's command. He hadn't felt anything as sharp and terrible as this in over seventy years, not since he was mortal, not since teeth severed his flesh in his last moments.

For the first time in over seventy years, he screamed.

Luxord used Gator's lapse in concentration to shove upwards, spinning them around until Luxord was the one pinning Gator to the ground. He pulled out cards and spread them over Gator's head as Gator tried to comprehend what had just happened.

What should he do?

What any real gator would do when faced with a hunter – run!

Gator sank into the ground as the cards flipped up and grew in size and swam as fast as his limbs could carry him. A glimpse back confirmed that they'd made another cage, and that Luxord was fast on his tail, pulling more cards out of his pocket. Luxord wasn't wasting his breath on cursing or complaining; instead, his face was set in determined lines as he ran.

But Gator knew the bayou better than Luxord did. It was quick work to find a stream that would blur his shadow and followed it to a shallow lake and curled in a crevasse at the bottom. Luxord waded in up to his knees and searched to no avail. The sun was setting, and set, leaving him with only the moon to guide him.

“Damn,” Luxord muttered. He ran his hands over his face as he waded out of the lake. Gator listened from below. “At least I obtained photographic confirmation of Heartless infestation. Initial thoughts – bigger than a Darkball, but smaller than an Invisible. No noticable magic. At least as smart as a dog.”

 _Hey!_ Gator thought.

“I saw no emblem, which means it's likely not from Hollow Bastion. Which makes it likely it was born here. So, then – we have at least one Boss Class heartless here. And with a population of humans this size – it'd be easy to support more monsters like that. If the cards fall in our favor, there may be one as powerful as the Bound One or the Seeker of Darkness.”

He kept on muttering to himself as he left. The gator waited until he was sure Luxord was gone to creep out of the lake and slink home. He hoped the bull would have something for his aching arm.


End file.
